The Coelura

by Anne McCaffrey

  “Be assured, Caissa, that the coelura are protected.”

  “The Oriolii sanction the Caverna’s contract?”

  Murell smiled oddly at some point over her head. “The benefits are manifold. The Oriolii may freely resume their position in the Triad. But I will avail myself of your offer . . .” he paused, bringing her hand to his lips, “of support if it is needed?”

  “For anything,” she cried fervently, clinging to his hands.

  “We must part. Anyone could see us. ‘Till tomorrow!”

  He had pushed off, into the fast down lane before she noticed the difference about him. His right forearm and leg were no longer bent in ill-set lines. She was relieved for his sake, but she would have been content to see him in any condition.

  She continued on to her apartment, her body and heart alive with the joy of having seen Murell and delivered her warning. She refused to consider the niggling doubt that Baythan was a far more accomplished tactician than a Caverna who had been sheltered from galactic-scale contingencies. It was only as she entered her reception room that she realized Murell had said enough to reassure her but left much unexplained, especially his presence in Blue City.

  Part of that was answered when Trin, with obsequious excitement, presented her with a shallow rectangular box of highly polished and unusually ornamented bluewood. As soon as Caissa took it, she knew what it must contain. Glancing at Trin’s expectant face, she believed that Trin did, too.

  “You did well to recall me, Trin.”

  “The Lady Caissa will open the bluewood box?” Trin’s question quavered with expectation.

  Caissa would have preferred privacy to savor the thrill of coelura but to deny Trin who had served her so long would have been ungracious, and uncharacteristic behavior in herself.

  As her fingers fumbled with the intricately carved fastening of the box, they triggered the lock’s message.

  “With this I discharge all debt.”

  Caissa almost dropped the gift at the implacable tone of Murell’s voice. Had she not chanced to see and speak with him, that message, piercing her heart as it did despite their meeting, would have compelled her in honor never to open the box.

  Now she could and did. Within the bluewood lay coelura fabric, palely quiescent until she touched the folds

  “You must put it on immediately, Lady Caissa,” Trin said in an awed whisper. “Only then will the spin live!” She stepped back to indicate that only Caissa could touch the length.

  Caissa experienced ambivalent feelings of reluctance and desire for an acquisition that she had never anticipated. With shaking hands, she put the box down and lifted out the delicate length of coelura spin. She glanced questioningly at the old dresser.

  “Wrap it about your body. It will fit itself,” said Trin.

  Caissa obeyed and suddenly the fabric was alive with shimmering color, smoothly creeping across her breasts and shoulders, snugging into her waist and down her hips to lap about her legs.

  “Be ceremonial, Lady Caissa,” whispered Trin, her hands clasped tightly under her chin, her eyes enormous with delight in her grey face.

  Regally, Caissa lifted her chin, squared her shoulders and pulled in her diaphragm, realizing for a fleeting miserable second that she copied that movement from her sire. Red spilled through the fabric and it ceased to cling to her legs but fell in graceful drapes to the floor. Then the color settled to echo the pattern of her heir-tattoo Caissa, with an arrogant expression, moved across the floor in the haughty gliding pace that she had been trained to assume for the greater ceremonials. So she would walk tomorrow. And in this robe!

  She could not maintain that cold imperiousness for long, not with the exultation she felt. Laughing uninhibitedly, she started to twirl in gladness, revelling in the comfort of the coelura against her bare skin. The fabric responded to her mood in pulsing reds and purples, shot with cerulean blues, breaking into spontaneous patterns as her steps fell into different dance modes. She exercised a hundred while Trin laughed and applauded until, exhausted by her excess, Caissa collapsed on her bed. Now the gown sobered and lovingly warmed her.

  “You’d best sleep in it tonight, Lady Caissa, so that it knows you, or tomorrow . . .” Trin’s expression was solemn. “If the Triads should learn that you’ve received a coelura robe…. Oh, I don’t know what I should do, my lady!” Trin’s hands pressed against her mouth in fear.

  “No one will know, Trin. And they couldn’t take it from me if they did know,” replied Caissa staunchly. She hugged herself and coelura lapped protectingly over her forearms. “They can never take it from me!”

  “Yes, the gown would die with you, my lady, but I wouldn’t want things to get that far,” cried Trin.

  “How long have you known about coelura, Trin?” Caissa suddenly thought to ask.

  “Oh, dressers like me, we’ve always known about coelura. I never thought to see it in my lifetime.” Trin shook her head slowly in wonder. “Tomorrow, when your sire signs that contract, you’ll outshine everyone else!” That prospect seemed to offer Trin tremendous satisfaction.

  Caissa could not admit to sharing a similar anticipation. Since the occasion was her sire’s, her attitude was unworthy.

  “Tonight you sleep in the coelura, Lady Caissa,” Trin repeated. “Tomorrow no one will know it’s coelura unless you let ‘em.”

  Tomorrow, reflected Caissa, everyone will know about coelura. And someone will think to inform the High Lady Cinna. The irony that she should possess coelura before her womb-mother was doubled by the fact that a person like Lady Cinna was the greatest danger to coelura. Her robe gently compressed about Caissa’s body, as if in sympathy as well as understanding.

  Murell had said, Caissa reminded herself firmly, that coelura would be protected. He had emphasized that. She only hoped that he knew what he was talking about. Did he, could he, appreciate how dangerous Baythan could be so close to a long-awaited fulfillment?

  The exhaustion of the day’s emotional stress overcame her. Despite her anxieties, or perhaps because she was enveloped in coelura, Caissa slept.

  She woke, unexpectedly refreshed, her coelura a gentle green, a shade that illuminated her lovely complexion and complemented her black hair. Trin arrived with a tray of food and exclaimed with approval at her mistress’s subtly enhanced beauty.

  “You’d better eat well my lady. It’s going to be a long day and with everything, you can’t risk coming over faint from lack of food.” Nourishment was an answer-all for Trin. “Coelura would give you away for certain if you aren’t feeling well.”

  The food did quiet the roiling in her stomach and Caissa ate more than she intended. She did not like surrendering the gown even for bathing and it clung lovingly to her hand until she, following Murell’s example, told it to behave. She kept its dulled green length in sight as she submitted to Trin’s ministrations. She sighed with relief when she could settle the coelura back about her shoulders.

  “Now set it in your colors, Lady Caissa.”

  She did and Trin could find no fault in shade, shape or drape.

  “You’ll never want for the perfect gown again, my lady,” said Trin. “It’s only just too bad as you aren’t the important contractee today in that robe. You’d have all eyes. No one would outshine you.”

  “Outshining has never been my ambition, Trin, as well you know.”

  “I know,” and Trin’s deep sigh bordered insolent regret, “but not for my want of trying. You shine now! I’ll watch it all.” She activated the wall screen and tuned it to the Great Hall, now a lucent white as befitted the occasion.

  Trin’s excitement was nothing to the aura exuded by the invited and chosen as they moved towards the Great Hall in the slow grav stream, decorously, so as not to disarrange their finery. The entry ways from all grav channels were lined with mirrors to permit last minute adjustments before entering. Caissa’s robe remained in immaculate folds about her as she stepped onto the platform. She moved politely forward in the p
ress and pretended to touch up her hair as she glanced at the throng pausing or passing her. Everyone was, as usual, far too occupied in their own appearance to notice anything unusual about hers. She waited in the anteroom as long as she could, hoping to locate Murell. He might have chosen to dress in lower caste neutrals to deliver her coelura yesterday but he did have an heir-tattoo. Surely he possessed rank enough to enter the Great Hall for the contracting of his Caverna.

  The Great Hall was filling: the hour for the ceremony and the Triads’ announcement near. Already the upper tiers were occupied by the ranking Cavernii and their body-heirs. Ambassadors and ministers from other planetary systems occupied booths and tanks or the balcony for oxygen breathers. Caissa thought wryly that her sire was certainly going to achieve maximum dissemination of his new contract as well as his mission’s success.

  Although she had no part in the ceremony, she was his body-heir and would stand the usual three steps behind him, to his right. She moved across the immense Hall to take her position on the lowest of the four steps leading up to the two ceremonial chairs, red and blue, set for the Triad Rulers. There was, she noticed, sufficient room for a third chair on that dais.

  With slow dignity, she viewed the assembled and, though she had often been a witness to prestigious contracts, she had never seen the Hall so crowded. Black guardroids kept open an aisle down which her sire would lead his new contract partner.

  The sonic call-to-order peeled melodiously, through the Hall to the subtly carved domed ceiling. Before the last echo had died, two notes summoned the Rulers of the Blue and Red Triad cities. There should be three, thought Caissa rebelliously. For surely the Yellow City would be reinstated and Demeathorn united in its original Triadic form.

  She had always known that the two Rulers were old but suddenly she realized how old they must be for unmistakably both wore coelura robes. She knew Blue Ruler to be in his fifteenth decade and Red Ruler was older. Blue Ruler’s gown was vibrant, sparkling; Red Ruler’s blurred. She remembered the gossip that Red Ruler had not completely recovered from his recent illness. His robe, now that she had some grasp of the properties of coelura, gave the strength to that report. Red Ruler’s body-heir now took his place and his garment, rich though it was, was a poor imitation of what his sire wore. He would need a coelura robe to maintain the dignity and authority of his office. How much compromise had been extracted from the obdurate Oriolii who had withstood sanctions for so long? Had the need for a new Ruler’s robe been an advantage? And for whom?

  Her robe began to shimmer and she hastily depressed her thoughts. The sonics trilled again, announcing the entrance of her sire and the Oriolis Caverna.

  Simultaneously Caissa observed two things: her sire was wearing coelura that rippled in muddy colors, vibrating disappointment or suppressed anger. Secondly, his partner, as beautiful and graceful as a Caverna ought to be, was also in distress but she was maintaining the striped pattern of blue, red and yellow. Nothing in Baythan’s noble bearing, his firm stride courteously shortened to match the Caverna’s, would indicate that all was not as it should be. Then his clothing settled into a firmer pattern of his colors but Caissa knew that Baythan, Minister Plenipotential, was under stress. Sufficient for his heir to realize that Baythan was not having everything his own way. Sufficient, Caissa hoped, not to notice his heir’s costume was unusual.

  Casual contracts or those between lower ranks were duly registered on the Memorax, but for persons of ministerial or cavernii status, documents were handscribed on a carefully treated paper which would instantly change color if tampered with after the final signing.

  Baythan’s chief aide presented the large and beautifully detailed contract to the Blue Triadic Ruler who made a show of reading before passing it to Red Ruler. Red Ruler’s body-heir stepped forward and spoke to his sire. Red Ruler looked more closely at the document and rose to his feet, assisted by his heir.

  “There is no mark,” the old man said in a clear but forceless voice, “or mention that this Contract has been approved by the Oriolis Cavernus.”

  Baythan’s robe streaked with grey, flushed to the red of embarrassment though Baythan obviously controlled his private anger more quickly than he could his garment. The Caverna swayed, the blues and reds of her gown attacked by the yellow stripes, travelling from heart to hem.

  “Gracious Rulers,” Baythan began, “the Cavernus Murell . . .”

  “The Cavernus Murell is present!”

  It was Caissa’s turn to sway, but joy and surprise merely deepened the pattern of her coelura to a pulsing brilliance noticeable to all close to her. Baythan had whirled at Murell’s carrying voice, instinctively supporting the Caverna with his left arm. Whether the girl had had any part in Murell’s crash, Caissa would never know and later doubted. The Caverna collected herself quickly as she turned towards the aisle.

  “I thought you dead, Murell!” Her voice rang with a relief and amazement which was, Caissa credited her by her robe, probably genuine. She would have rushed to the figure striding in the magnificence of coelura stripes, but Baythan’s grasp recalled her to the proprieties.

  “My profound apologies for this belated appearance, gracious Rulers,” and Murell made an obeisance, just proper for a Cavernus before a Ruler, yet something about his person--his robes--lent him an air and authority equal to that of the Triadic Rulers. “My vehicle, doubtless due to worn parts, crashed seven weeks ago and was so damaged that no signal indicated my position. When my injuries were sufficiently healed, I returned to my Cavern. I have but just learned of your gracious consent to reinstate the Oriolii.” Then he stepped beside the Caverna who stared fixedly at him.

  Red Ruler smartly extended the contract to Murell who bowed before accepting it.

  “That document is valid only if the Caverna is both Oriolis heir and body-heir,” said Red Ruler firmly, sternly glancing at Blue Ruler who affected polite dismay.

  Holding the paper by top and bottom, Murell appeared to study the paragraphs, his expression politely intent, but Caissa was positive that he had known its contents beforehand and had carefully timed his unexpected arrival.

  “A minor addition will validate it since I am Cavernus and Oriolis body-heir.” Murell turned now and, for the first time, acknowledged the presence of Baythan with a very correct bow. “I certainly have no wish to protest such a distinguished connection or deprive the Caverna of the wisdom and advice of your Excellency as her contractual partner, one so keenly interested in Oriolii welfare.

  “However,” and Murell turned back to the two Rulers, “as Cavernus and body-heir, rank and duty compel me to be First Comptroller in all matters pertaining to coelura spin.” There was a stir of suppressed excitement and shock in the audience. Murell bowed. “You will find my administration impartial since I have no prejudice for those along the Base of the Triangle. It profits neither your two Cities nor Oriolii to continue an isolation for a cause that no longer exists. The species ‘coelura’ are secure.”

  Red and Blue Rulers leaned together across the gap between their chairs. Blue Ruler’s shoulders were hunched with the urgency of the arguments he made to Red Ruler. Caissa spared a glance at her sire and saw that his colors were remarkably settled, his face composed. She admired his containment at what must be a severe check to his ambitions for there was little doubt in Caissa’s mind that Baythan intended, through the Caverna, to control coelura spins. He turned his head slightly, his lips moving in a phrase audible only to the Caverna. The girl blinked once, the only indication of surprise before her lips formed the negative. Baythan relaxed and the slight tilt of satisfaction in the set of his shoulders made Caissa wonder what her sire’s cunning mind had devised at this juncture.

  The two Rulers had ended their conference and Red Ruler asked that the writer be summoned. Then he gestured to the assembled, giving permission for them to speak quietly among themselves.

  Caissa could not quit her position and there was no one near enough with whom she could have c
onversed had she been of that mind. Except Murell. And she couldn’t acknowledge him yet. Murell now came down the step to her sire. Baythan, with a gracious smile, extended his hand. As if released from a paralysis, the Caverna clutched at Murell’s right arm with both hands, her face turned up to his, her lips moving rapidly, explaining many things as fast as she could. Murell covered her hands with his, his manner reassuring. Baythan exchanged a few more words with Murell who regarded the Minister for a long moment. Caissa saw Murell ask one single quiet question and then her sire gestured towards her.

  Caissa exerted every ounce of self-control to keep her gown from responding to the leap of emotion that surged through her. Murell inclined his head in her direction and then bowed formally to Baythan.

  At this point, the writer, with assistants carrying his tall table and casket of writing implements, appeared from the Triadic offices. Baythan beckoned Caissa, his expression politely but earnestly entreating. She knew with a joy that did cause her robe to shimmer what her sire wanted of her. She almost burst out laughing at the irony. Baythan would not find her so compliant if he tried to override Murell in the matter of coelura.

  “Caissa, as my body-heir, I have the right to request you to consider your first contract to further our mutual interests.”

  Caissa acknowledged that right.

  “Would you consent to a contract with Cavernus Murell? I can assure you that the privileges of such a contract far outweigh any other that I have recommended to you.”

  Caissa made the filial obeisance before she looked at Murell. She was very nearly undone by the twinkle of his eyes.

  “What form of contract, my sire?”

  “With so much at issue, Baythan,” said Murell, “I must insist on a body contract of five standard years to ensure the health of that heir.”